In a grammar exercise I am doing, I was asked to fill in the blanks in the following sentence:

Ta _____ níos sine ná _____. (He is older than she is, with "he" and "she" being the emphatic forms.)

I filled in the blanks with seisean and sise. The answer key says seisean and ise.

What do you say? This seems to me as though it may be about a comparable issue in English, which is, do you say "He is older than she [is]" or "he is older than her"? Could you imagine people speaking Irish saying either version, with the subject form OR the object form for the feminine pronoun? Or does it have to be one way, and if so, which way?

I would like to add that this particular grammar exercise was not properly proofread and contained multiple errors, so I do not have confidence in the answer key--hence my question here.

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Brand new Irish learner inclined to ask questions. Writer, Words & Worlds of New York, a website about language-learning. http://www.ellenjovin.com

I'm guessing it's a typo. I'm fairly sure it should be "seisean" and "sise," though it's been a while since I've done this kind of construction. It definitely wouldn't be "seisean" and "ise," though, as the masculine equivalent of "ise" is "eisean,"

Redwolf

Another question--same theme, same grammar book.

Right after I was told that "sé" was the subject form and "é" the object form for the male singular personal pronoun, I was told that to introduce someone, I would say, "Seo é Liam."

So you use the object form in that construction? Would it be possible to use the subject form or is it definitely always the object form? I mean, the structure does not suggest object to me, but perhaps I am misunderstanding somehow, and anyway I can certainly accept that idiom can override general guidelines, as happens at times in any language.

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Brand new Irish learner inclined to ask questions. Writer, Words & Worlds of New York, a website about language-learning. http://www.ellenjovin.com

Thank you, Redwolf. Our messages crossed, and I didn't see your response to part 1 until after I had posted part 2 of my questions.

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Brand new Irish learner inclined to ask questions. Writer, Words & Worlds of New York, a website about language-learning. http://www.ellenjovin.com

Actually sé, sí, siad and seisean, sise, siadsan are subject pronouns of verbs except "is".
In all other cases you use é, í, iad, eisean ise, iadsan.
Seo é Liam has "is" implied in some way (actually if you really express "is" you say "Is é seo Liam").

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

I don't know the technical terminology for any of this (hopefully one of our grammar people will chime in at some point), but I do know that these forms are always used with the copula (and this is technically a copula sentence).

Crossed with Lughaidh.

Redwolf

To follow on from what Lughaidh and Redwolf were saying, there are three types of pronoun in Standard Irish: subject, object and "is" (copula). The object and copula forms are almost identical, the only difference is thú vs. tú. There's a nice table showing the three forms on this grammar web site: http://nualeargais.ie/gnag/person.htm

I recommend you bookmark that site, because it's a great reference grammar: http://nualeargais.ie/gnag/gram.htm

Edit: Correction in red

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Táim ag foghlaim fós. Fáilte roimh gach aon cheartúchán.

not really, and it's not better explained on the site. You don't always use tú/tusa with the copula, see:

Is tusa Seán.
Is fear thusa.

both have the copula though...
Normally, immediately after the copula you use tú/tusa ; if a word is between the copula and the pronoun, then you can use thú/thusa (or sometimes tú/tusa in Ulster).
But always é, í, iad etc.

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

That's what I say, but I thought using thusa with the copula was just a Munster thing. You are saying that "Is fear thusa" and "is fear tusa" are both valid in Ulster? What do they say in Connacht?

"Is tusa Seán" is what people say in Munster. I thought there was no séimhiú because of the DNTLS rule, and that "Ní thusa" and "Nach thusa" would be the normal form for Munster (Ní tusa, nach tusa in Standard). But I never asked anyone about it or looked into it properly.

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Táim ag foghlaim fós. Fáilte roimh gach aon cheartúchán.

Thú is always the direct object of a verb Molaim thú I praise you
or the predicate in a copular saying Mo ghrá thú You're my love
In other cases it's usual to use tú
Ar chuala tu?
Is tú an amadán.
Nach tú an captaen?
Gan tú.
Tú a bheith i ngrá.

Anyway that's more or less what the Brothers say. (If I understood it properly...}